Oversight and Investigations Subcommittee April 30, 2024

Table Of Content

• Building Climate Resilience
• h Congress
• Oceans and Combatting the Climate Crisis
• Dirty Water: Toxic “Forever” PFAS Chemicals Are Prevalent in the Drinking Water of Environmental Justice Communities
• News Register to join - Tapping Nature-Based Climate Solutions Across California
• Biden Deals Devastating Blows to Alaskan Communities, Tribes and Energy Security
• Accelerating nature-based solutions to achieve California’s climate change goals
• Biden delays consideration of new natural gas export terminals, citing climate risk

Democrats are committed to fighting the effects of climate change and supporting solutions that ensure reliable water resources for the benefit of communities, ecosystems, and economies. The new mandates place conservation on par with energy development, livestock grazing and other uses as a management priority, and outline a host of conservation policy tools and initiatives designed to “protect intact natural landscapes and restore degraded landscapes” in the face of a warming climate. An Energy Department spokesman said the agency is considering Sempra’s application but doesn’t have a timetable for making a decision. Nobody submitted public comments or protests before a Feb. 8 deadline — not an unusual occurrence for an approval process that climate activists say has traditionally served as a rubber stamp on gas exports. Proponents of trophy hunting argue that hunting fees benefit species conservation and support local communities.

Building Climate Resilience

Rep. Debbie Dingell (D-Mich.) said during the committee hearing last year that prohibiting FWS’ ability to regulate lead ammunition and fish tackle would likely lead it to have to close more federal lands to hunting and fishing in order to comply with ESA and other federal laws if wildlife is being hurt. Conflicts between preserving the land as wilderness and using it for logging, grazing and mining often fall to this committee and then Congress to resolve. The panel also oversees water projects, many environmental issues and even management of wildlife refuges.

h Congress

Urban Forestry and Natural Resources Advisor, Dr. Beatriz Nobua-Behrmann, is an expert in urban forest management and the management of invasive pests in urban forests and wildland/urban interface areas. Our California Natural Resources Agency and many of its departments have moved homes for the first time in six decades! We are excited to welcome you to our interactive and environmentally friendly new campus at the corner of 8th and P Streets. The agency would also have to to reissue canceled mineral leases, which would not be subject to litigation.

Oceans and Combatting the Climate Crisis

Those types of policies are already advancing in California, where a 100% clean energy mandate is written into state law and more than 40 cities and counties have banned or discouraged gas hookups in new housing. Sempra’s SoCalGas subsidiary has pushed back against all-electric building codes, opposing such proposals from Los Angeles to San Luis Obispo. In an application submitted to the Energy Department on Nov. 18, a Sempra subsidiary asked for permission to send 240 billion cubic feet of natural gas to Mexico each year, most of which would be shipped overseas from a facility to be built in the Sinaloa port town of Topolobampo. The project is in early stages of development and has received little public attention. “The majority of the world’s energy consumption in the next couple decades is going to come from Asia.

Limiting Access and Damaging Gateway Economies: Examining the National Parks Air Tour Management Program ... - Hearing Committee Activity The House Committee on Natural Resources

Limiting Access and Damaging Gateway Economies: Examining the National Parks Air Tour Management Program ....

Posted: Tue, 05 Dec 2023 08:00:00 GMT [source]

Dirty Water: Toxic “Forever” PFAS Chemicals Are Prevalent in the Drinking Water of Environmental Justice Communities

3397, sponsored by Utah Republican Rep. John Curtis, which targets BLM’s conservation and landscape health rule, finalized this month. 6285, the “Alaska’s Right to Produce Act,” which would reverse the Biden administration’s cancellation of oil leases in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge and block the Interior Department’s recently finalized rule to limit oil and gas leasing on 13 million acres of the National Petroleum Reserve-Alaska. Another bill on the agenda would force the Bureau of Land Management to drop its contentious conservation and landscape health rule.

News Register to join - Tapping Nature-Based Climate Solutions Across California

The committee is crucial to Representatives with many of the nation’s public lands in its districts, especially those from the West. The Subcommittee is also charged with developing and overseeing the implementation of laws managing domestic and international fisheries and other ocean and Great Lakes resources. The United States has made great strides in making fisheries more economically and environmentally sustainable, as well as in protecting vulnerable ocean ecosystems and species like sharks, whales, and coral. Democratic Members will continue protecting marine ecosystems and increasing sustainability and transparency of our fisheries. Southern California's unique geography makes it an internationally recognized center for biological diversity.

Committee Advances Legislation Furthering Access, Conservation Goals - Hearing Committee Activity The House Committee on Natural Resources

Committee Advances Legislation Furthering Access, Conservation Goals.

Posted: Wed, 20 Sep 2023 07:00:00 GMT [source]

We recommended participants briefly peruse the existing priority nature-based climate solutions and the cross-cutting priorities prior to joining, which can be found here. Areas across the American West—California, Nevada, Oregon, and Washington—and Hawai‘i are now experiencing life at the forefront of the climate crisis, facing destructive wildfires, severe droughts, rising sea levels, and more. NRDC is working with local leadership, businesses, and advocacy groups to push for 21st-century energy systems; advocate for legislation to curb climate-damaging pollution; and create programs that will protect vulnerable communities, lands, and waters.

Accelerating nature-based solutions to achieve California’s climate change goals

And in the absence of reliable sources of natural gas, they’re going to continue to use their domestic coal resources,” Sempra executive Brian Lloyd said at an event Tuesday hosted by the Utah Petroleum Assn. That argument mirrors the gas industry’s long-standing claim that it can help fight climate change because its product burns more cleanly than coal, the most polluting fossil fuel. The American Petroleum Institute, an industry trade group, released a report last year finding that switching to U.S.-produced gas could reduce emissions from coal-fired power plants by about 50% in China, Germany and India.

Biden delays consideration of new natural gas export terminals, citing climate risk

UCCE's s Natural Resources Program provides research-based information, tools and training to serve as the basis for sound natural resource management in Los Angeles, Orange and Ventura counties. There are several actions that could trigger this block including submitting a certain word or phrase, a SQL command or malformed data. A stay in long-running litigation over the Snake River Dams has been extended for 60 days from August 31st to October 31st to allow federal mediation to continue, but key stakeholders and community members directly impacted by the litigation are being left in the dark as negotiations take place behind closed doors.

Democrats have sponsored and passed bipartisan legislation to strengthen enforcement mechanisms to stop IUU fishing and implementing legislation for the Agreement on Port State Measures to Prevent, Deter, and Eliminate Illegal, Unreported, and Unregulated Fishing (PSMA). Moving forward, Democrats will continue to work to protect American fisheries, stop human rights abuses in the seafood supply chain, and strengthen coastal economies. Illegal, unregulated and unreported (IUU) fishing is any unlawful practice that does not comply with national, regional, or global fisheries management or conservation requirements. The loss of biodiversity is one of the most urgent environmental problems we face today.

Stauber has argued the leases were “arbitrarily canceled” under both the Obama and Biden administrations. Westerman had vowed that his committee would work to get Curtis’ bill to the floor quickly, and Curtis discussed the issue during a field hearing in his home state. Biden nixed the ANWR leases last year, blaming a faulty environmental review done by the Trump administration. They were sold in a small oil auction mandated by Congress that garnered only a handful of participants. The Natural Resources Agency will be soliciting public input to inform the updated strategy over the coming months through a series of public workshops and tribal roundtables. Wildland-Urban Interface Fire Advisor, Dr. Luca Carmignani, specializes in wildfire preparedness and community fire resilience.

Democrats on the Subcommittee are committed to managing, developing, and improving America’s water supply in an environmentally and economically sound manner. Democrats are also dedicated to developing our domestic energy resources by promoting affordable, environmentally-sustainable hydroelectricity. 615, sponsored by Rep. Rob Wittman (R-Va.), which would prohibit the Interior and Agriculture departments from banning the use of lead ammunition or tackle on any of the federal lands or waters under their jurisdiction. 615, the Protecting Access for Hunters and Anglers Act of 2023, introduced by U.S.

The commission is considering several applications, including the expansion of an already approved Sempra facility in Port Arthur, Texas, and a Louisiana facility proposed by Houston-based Commonwealth LNG. Sempra submitted its application just two days after receiving approval from the Mexican government to build a different gas export terminal in Baja California. But Biden has rejected calls to endorse a ban on fracking, the drilling technique that spurred extraction booms from New Mexico to Pennsylvania and helped make the United States the world’s largest producer of natural gas. And there are early indications his administration might look kindly on American companies eager to ship the abundant fuel overseas.